PROJECT HIGHLIGHT | East Rosedale Monument Project

Christopher Blay’s artwork for East Rosedale Avenue recognizes the role of transit buses in the civil rights movement from the 1950s through the 1970s and connects the struggle for equal rights and justice from a national narrative to a local one.

For East Rosedale Monument Project, the artist transformed a vintage transit bus into a public artwork as a way of talking about the history of buses in the civil rights movement and preserving that history. From the Montgomery bus boycotts and the Freedom Riders to the busing of students for integration, the transit bus has played a key role in the fight for justice and equality. Engraved panels within the bus shell focus on these stories along with others who protested the policies of segregation and fought for justice and equality here in Fort Worth. This monument also engages with the conversation about national monuments and which stories get to be canonized in the public sphere.

Over the years many historic buildings have been lost in one of the oldest historic African American neighborhoods in America; however, Christopher Blay notes,

 By placing this monument to the struggle for equality in full view of the city, and highlighting its connection to that very cause, we not only recognize the Evans neighborhood’s connection to that struggle, but also place a marker to where we’ve been, and where we are going.     

The sculpture was installed mid-June, with lighting and electrical components to follow.  In connection with the public artwork, a poetry contest will be held in the neighborhood with the winning poem displayed on an electronic screen in the monument.